The concept stays the same on the web. Recently I’ve been seeing tweets on Soshified this and Soshified that, and I was wondering what was up. Through a little browsing and searching, it turns out Soshified was remodeling their forum skin powered by Invisionboard. It was expected to launch on May 9th, and so I can definitely understand how they feel when you’re waiting for something to come up, especially a forum or community where you spend a lot of time socializing, learning, and talking about your favorite topic.

One of Soshified’s goals was to become a trending topic on twitter. Now, knowing me, I didn’t really know what a trending topic on twitter was. I assumed it was randomly generated depending on what’s been talking at the moment, but in the end I was close in that it was just the most talked about topic on twitter. In other words, spamming the word or hashtag (well, I’m sure twitter has some logic behind it). It was pretty crazy, because when I was searching for the “Soshified” term, twitter would notify me that there were 40+ more tweets since I’ve searched, and I’m like….I’ve just loaded this search page ><.

Now that's what I call dedication from fans and loyal subscribers. They eventually reached Trending Topic (TT) status and even beat out a topic such as Iron Man 2 which surprised me the most because considering Iron Man 2 is a bit more global than what Soshified is since it was a movie that started showing since Friday.

In the end, Soshified released their new layout, which is actually stunning to me that it was a forum skin. Check out my article on skinning vs designing in the near future. In the meantime, as always, keep dedicated to something/someone and you’ll reach your goals. As with Soshified, they had their loyal group of fans, they all united together because of their love for a famous girl group named SNSD, and because of that, they’ve grown into a massive community where they can enjoy and share their thoughts on what they like.

Adobe (famously known for their Photoshop and Flash products) have finally launched a tease of their new products.  It’s almost like everything we dreamed that CS4 could do, they implemented it into CS5.  Knowing that, I’m already going to be in awe to see what CS6, CS7, CS8, and such will bring to the new generation.

Adobe’s new CS is coming soon

As always, there are a few suites a designer or developer can buy to gain access to a collective of programs that would help their workflow and save a few hundred dollars.  There’s the creative design suite for those dealing with design, and there’s also the web suite which is obviously tailored for the web designers and developers.  Or, if you have the money to spend, then you can drop it all on the master collection.

Adobe TV Launches Creative Suite 5 Features

Adobe just launched their video to show some of the features behind Adobe CS5 Suite in action.  If you haven’t watched it yet, you should go and take a look at Adobe TV and watch the movie.

The video shows many unique features from content aware fill, to smart dashes, to browser control.

CS5 Features that made me go “Wow”

There’s so many features of CS5 that was shown, and probably features that they haven’t shown, but already the Web features they showed has almost gotten me to take the switch to use Dreamweaver….or maybe not.

Dreamweaver

The new Adobe Dreamweaver showcases a better engine to be able to view/edit sites made through complex platforms like Wordpress or Joomla. In addition, you can see all the linked files that makes the site run, and it also features a new add-on program called “Browser Lab” or something like that (only watched the video once). Basically, it mimics all the current browsers and older browsers so that you can see how your site matches up in different browsers especially that dreadful and annoying Internet Explorer. The best thing about it is the “Onion Skin” mode where you can compare the different browser’s rendering on top of each other and see the little differences between them via outlines.

Photoshop

Smart Radius. Smart Radius. Smart Radius. I’m not spamming for keywords, but just to say that this new tool gets rid of a lot of problems when cutting a stock that has difficult areas such as hair, or spikes. Remember pen tooling to get those exact cut? Well, with smart radius you can do a nice clean extraction without having to spend a lot of time zooming into the picture and adjusting your pen tool points. Although it probably won’t be as exact as the pen tool, you’re still saving a lot of time that can be spent, sleeping or doing another work.

Flash Catalyst

Flash Catalyst is a new addition to the Adobe family, and basically it gives designers a chance to make some really good looking flash sites without delving into any Actionscript or code at all. I’m not familiar on how it works, but from the looks of it, you can import your PSD or AI and then probably just add effects to it like presets in After Effects. I’m excited to see what this program can do. Although, my hatred of flash is pretty much on top of my mind now. I’m not an advocate of HTML5 and it’s new canvas engine, neither am I a big hater of Flash, I just hope that Flash Catalyst can actually help me get through my flash animation obstacles that clients always want. However, on another note, if you haven’t heard about HTML5 or seen any development, check out this article about HTML5 and how it can replace flash (for simple things at least).

Is CS5 worth to get

I don’t know. The thing that’s holding me back is the fact that it’s not out yet and I don’t quite have the money to upgrade. However, I will download the trial because I’m more interested in the new Dreamweaver and seeing how fast it can be. Like most people, I like doing code in its most archaic form. Notepad (well, Coda/Notepad++) and Mozilla Firefox along with those Firefox add-ons for web development.

One of the highlights of the trip was attending a Cirque du Soleil show at the MGM Hotel with my employer’s family, and it turned out to be an inspirational show and time I couldn’t forget.

At the MGM Theatre, they were having the Cirque du Soleil show called KÀ. Here’s an excerpt of what it is from their site:

KÀ, the unprecedented, gravity-defying production by Cirque du Soleil takes adventure to an all new level. KÀ is a heroic journey of love and conflict, set within a dynamic theatrical landscape, as an entire empire appears on KÀ’s colossal stage and a captivating display of acrobatics envelops the audience.

On Saturday, I watched the show along with my employer’s family. Before the show we went to get some cheap tickets, and it ended up costing $80 for one ticket (which I still have to owe…I’ll get that soon….). We had lunch at California’s Pizza Kitchen which happened to be my first time eating there, and it was really good.

To get back on topic, I waited in line to get into the show, and some of the attendants there were dressed up and acting in unique characters trying to get the audience involved and on their toes. I found it quite amusing, and then I met up with the family and proceeded into the theatre.

The first thing I noticed was the iron steampunk-like architecture that was near the walls of the theatre. In addition, there was a cloud of smoke in the center of a stage with an occasional flame bursting into the air. From there, I was saying to myself that this isn’t going to be some regular Nutcracker play that I saw during grade school.

During the whole show, the stage shifted and transformed into different landscapes and the acrobatics and martial arts of the actors were phenomenal. The tempo of the music, and the lighting of the scene all played along with the mood of the current situation of the play. It was an amazing show that inspired me to want to like plays as a whole and to also look beyond regular movies and tv shows for entertainment.

If you’re in Las Vegas, or any places that premieres Cirque du Soleil’s shows, I highly recommend spending some money to see it. It’s a show you won’t forget for a long time, and a show that’s worth the money. Below is a trailer of it, and thanks for visiting my blog. I’ll make some frequent updates once I get back into schedule. Daylight Savings Time is still hitting me, even though it doesn’t affect Arizona.

They’re not blogs, and they’re definitely not just a gallery of pictures. These sites are actual communities or a group of artists put together that strive to push forward the limits of art and graphics and show the art community their talent.

depthcore

Depthcore is probably my favorite art group that release large packs (they call them “Chapters“) of artworks that are usually themed to a subject. All sorts of digital media are included such as graphics, digital drawings, 3D modeling, photography, and even music. This group contains some pretty big designers like Justin Maller, Pete Harrison, Nik Ainley and Jeff Huang.

I enjoy their music and all of the artworks posted in these chapters. With over 30+ chapters, if this is your first time visiting depthcore, then make sure you have some spare time to browse through them. Depthcore has grown a lot since its first establishment in 2002.

Visit Depthcore – http://depthcore.com

The Raster Group

The Raster Group was created in 2001 and is more targeted to digital art and drawings however you will see some other types of art in there chapters as well. Similar to depthcore, Raster is comprised of a group of artists showing their best work.

slashTHREE

slashTHREE is much like the others however containing a different collective of artists and designers. They feature graphics, artwork, music, photography, and even motion videos. One noticeable feature is their forum. Other artists and designers are able to talk to each other and network and even submit artwork to their art packs.

Behance Network

Behance Network is a community that holds a lot of portfolios of designers and artists. They contain many different types of artists, from graphics, and all the way to interior design. If you’re a designer, you should check the portfolios here and even apply for one as they also have a job board that you can check out and even employers themselves will seek for potential workers here.

deviantART

Deviantart is probably the most popular art community that’s out there. Being a very public place, any type of art is posted here. However, some of the quality of the work may not be as great as the other design community listed. (That’s purely based on the fact that deviantart has more quantity of works than the other communities)

deviantART is also a great center for resources and tutorials. Many artists contribute and share their works and resources so others can use them and make great work from them. You can also join communities and groups so you can be around other artists and designers that have similar interests as you.

One of my favorite feature of deviantART is the ability to favorite works and follow artists. With this feature you can always be updated when your favorite artists post a new piece of work or also view your gallery of favorites for inspiration.

Design Flavr

DesignFlavr is not really a community nor a group, but another inspirational design gallery site. I added this in here because it is also another great source of inspiration and showcases art of many different fields. Digital, Web, CG, Flash, Illustrations, and more. You can submit your own, and be featured here as well.

Conclusion

I hope you enjoyed my post about design communities. These art groups and communities always showcases great work since the submissions to the packs and chapters are selectively chosen and filtered to show the best ones. Thanks for subscribing and following my inspiration posts. If you have other communities in mind, leave a comment and share a link. I’ll see you again next Monday.

For this week, I want to share 5 blogs that I usually visit everyday for tips, inspiration, resources, and sometimes I even get sidetracked to even more leads for inspiration and more.

1. Abduzeedo – http://abduzeedo.com

Abduzeedo is really awesome for its variety and broadness (although still maintaining to its niche of graphic design, inspiration, and tutorials). It has numerous links, articles, tutorials, and interviews where you can just get lost the whole day just browsing this site and going through the links. One of my favorite parts of the site is the “Daily Inspiration” posts that comes up…daily. Basically people start sending their links and they hand select a few to show up as their daily inspiration. Participating in this can get your name out as well as seeing other works out there that may inspire you to make something. The tutorials here are well written and the resources you can find here are very useful for commercial or personal use depending on their license.

In addition, they recently redesigned the blog, and it’s looking very smooth.

2. The Strange Attractor – http://thestrangeattractor.net

A simple blog that shares some inspirational pieces from artists around the world. Very nice if you’re looking for different types of art, design, and different forms of media. I’m not so exposed regular to these genre of art, however, this site fills in those gaps for me. It’s one of those sites where you can’t really stop on page one.

3. Buamai – http://buamai.com

Similar to The Strange Attractor, Buamai features more of a thumbnail gallery and a random one at that. It’s not really just art, but other pictures as well. Nevertheless, art and inspirational pictures that you can spark ideas from.

4. DesignIsKinky – http://designiskinky.com

Don’t be so fooled by its name. It’s nothing sexual at all. An Australian site, but it shows different designs and media arts from different places. Not always my taste, but it’s best to expose oneself to different types of art rather than just graphic design.

5. TUTS+ Network – http://tutsplus.com

Probably one of my favorite sites to go to. Tutorials, resources, interviews, all in one place. The best part of this network is the multiple branches of it. Photoshop, Vector, After Effects, CG, and Programming. Lots of tutorials, resources, and inspiration can be found here. The staff that’s running this network have done a lot to contribute and create a community that many designers follows.

Conclusion

Those are my hot spots blogs and sites that I visit regularly for some ideas or whenever I’m bored. If you have a favorite place to visit, post yours, and I’ll mention it in another roundup in the future to thank you.

And yes, I purposely put the date on this blog for February 22nd. It’s my way to sneakily put this in. Thanks for visiting.